Wish I Could Stay
by Indarae
Summary: Percy looks back on life at Hogwarts, takes place end of PoA. (PG-13 for language)


A/N: While writing a chapter of Sunday, Bloody Sunday, I heard a song on my playlist called "The Old Crowd." This ficlet developed. It's not a songfic, so don't go looking up the song (unless you like really perky 60's songs), but here's the rundown — the song's about a girl looking back on her high school days and missing it. So, of course, I started thinking about high school... (and then started remembering why I was glad to graduate)... but I've started to miss part of it too... and then, it became what would someone feel if they didn't want to leave school at all?' And thus, "Wish I Could Stay". 

Disclaimer: Ha! You've been disclaimed! (Percy and Oliver belong to JKR, Davie is the name my firstborn son will receive, and Leslie Gore belongs... to herself.)

Wish I Could Stay

"Sometimes I get to thinking, bout days gone by

And I start cryin' every time

What I wouldn't give, if I could just relive

One day with those old friends of mine."

-Leslie Gore, "The Old Crowd"

I sigh and fold another pair of ratty old boxers, folding them up and storing them away at the top of a pile in my trunk. I never knew it would be this hard to say good-bye to a building. It's just a building, right? Just a castle at the top of a hill, in the middle of Scottland, in a place no Muggles can see it.

Just a building? No. A home. For seven years of good times and bad, heartbreak and sorrow, joy and pain alike; it was home. More of a home than the place I went back to every summer, crowded and poor. Is that how life would always be, crowded and poor?

And that was it. The last pair of boxers, the last posession of Percival Weasley to make its home in the little dormitory at the top of the stairs. My roommates have already left. They thought it quite odd I put off my packing until the last minute. They were so happy to leave, the NEWTs behind them, jobs laid out in front of them. My NEWT scores were good. Why am I going to work at the Ministry of Magic when Oliver's off to be a Quidditch star and Davie's off to be an Auror?

Percy Weasley. The smart one. Cares about his work, the good one. Doesn't play tricks like his brothers, the polite one. The boring one, more like it. Seven years of blood, sweat, and tears, and where did I end up? Back at square one. Percy Weasley, with a stick up his ass.

But did I ever believe it would be different? I'm the Lone Weasley, the one without a sibling my age. I'm the one who remembers living at home during the Troubles, waiting for Mum to drag me off to the cellar to hide from the glowing skull and snake in the sky. I'm the one who knew what the black envelope which appeared on Mrs. Harrington's doorstep next door meant. Fred and George weren't old enough to understand that if a black envelope came to our doorstep, they'd have no father, or no brothers named Bill and Charlie. I'm the one with the world left on my shoulders for 18 bloody years longer than it should've been left there. I'm not Atlas, I'm just a skinny red-head with glasses.

Eighteen. I'm eighteen. And I'm going to work at the bloody Ministry with my Da, when Oliver's off to be a Quidditch star and Davie's off to be an Auror. Oliver gets fame, Davie gets death. Do I really want either?

I want to be Minister of Magic, that's why I'm doing this, taking a low paying job in a boring department. One step at a time, one step toward the top. That's not instant fame, like Oliver gets — that's damned hard work. That's what Weasleys do, we work our lives away, unless you're Fred or George.

I want to be Minister of Magic — is that fame I'm seeking? Or power? Or is it something else? I want people to look at me and say "Isn't that Percy Weasley?" and not "Oh, another Weasley." Does that make me different from the rest of my brothers? Or am I really just the same, another Weasley from the same mold.

Seven years. And now it won't ever be home again. I'm not a student, I'm a graduate of Hogwarts. Formerly of Gryffindor House. It doesn't matter what House I spent seven years in, anymore. I don't have to hate Slytherins and envy Ravenclaws and feel sorry for Hufflepuffs. Outside these walls, it doesn't matter, anymore.

I'm off to be a Ministry worker, while Oliver goes to be a Quidditch star and get his name plastered on the front page of the Daily Prophet, and Davie goes to risk his life and end up the cause of a little black envelope. But me... I'm going home to the Burrow to lead a boring, simple life as a Ministry employee.

I close the drawer and levitate my trunk. I can hear Fred and George calling for me to hurry up. They won't understand, not for another two years. They can't understand what it means to stand in this empty room and suddenly know that seven years... are gone.

And that I'll spend the rest of my life wishing that seven years would never end. Oliver's going away, to be a Quidditch player. Davie's going away, to train as an Auror. But me, I'm staying behind.

And I take one last look around. And I close the door.

A/N: thanks for reading, let me know what you think!


End file.
